Eastern Dreams by Penny

Goodly morning everyone!  Penny here again with a couple of projects from the 'Eastern' shows last month.  I hope you are all warm and well despite the weather, and that you'll join me for a few minutes of crafty inspiration.  

Tag of the Orient

My first project is a simple, pretty tag using the Eastern Grasses,   Artistic Affirmations, and Serenity stamp sets; Distress Inks, black Versafine ink, acetate, clear embossing powder and a few embellishments and dies from my stash.  

I began by blending the Distress Inks onto a piece of white card and die cutting it in a large tag shape.  I then stamped the grasses in black ink along the bottom  and top edges of the tag and added gold pen around the edges.  I stamped the word 'Dream' near the top of the tag and a little bird beside it.  I then added gold pearldrops around the stamped images.  

I took a piece of acetate and stamped the grasses in a frame image with black ink and embossed it with clear powder.  I cut the acetate into a strip a little bigger than the stamped image and wider than the tag.  I scored the ends of the acetate about a quarter of an inch from the edge of the strip.  I used red double sided tape along the edges of the strip and attached it to the back of the tag.  The acetate forms a dome over the stamped grasses on the tag.  I then matted the tag onto black card and cut around it leaving a border.  I punched a hole in the top centre of the tag and added a Chinese coin and some fibres from my stash.  I also added a clay butterfly that I painted gold, and attached it to the acetate with glitter glue. 

To finish this tag off I added a little black glitter glue to the flowers for extra sparkle and texture.  This tag makes a lovely piece of home decor or a present.


   

Oriental Garden

For my second project I have a mixed media card featuring stamps from the Serenity and  Artistic Affirmations sets; Distress Inks, Versamark ink, gold embossing powder, alcohol pens, gold pen and liquid pearls and a stencil from my stash.


I began with a piece of white card and blended Distress Inks on it.  I then took my stencil which happened to be Oriental themed and added one of the inks through it, giving a subtle layer on top of the background.  I added gold pen around the edges of the card. 

The next stage was to make the focal elements.  I stamped the serene lady and some foliage onto white card and embossed them in gold.  I used the same inks to colour the images as on the background panel, except for the lady's skin which I coloured with pens.  I then carefully cut all the images out, including the background of the lady.  

 

I took a white base card and used one of the inks to stamp some foliage and little swirls along both sides of the front of the card.  I finished it off by blending the same ink around the edges. 

I stamped a word  in one of the top corners of the background panel using black Versafine, then added gold pearl drops around it.  I then matted the panel onto black card and attached it to the base card.  I took the embossed focal images and attached them in 3D onto the card, and added some more pearl drops.

I wanted to create a calm, soothing scene for this card, with the serene lady in the cool calm garden.  I absolutely LOVED creating with these stamps, I hope you do too! 

Thanks for popping in today, another of my teamies will be here with more lovely artwork tomorrow.

Crafty hugs,

                                                             Penny